Cargo Return Spacecraft In Works
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By Michael A. Taverna
PARIS - Europe is starting definition of a cargo download spacecraft that could eventually lead to an independent manned space transportation system capability.
Under a 21 million euro ($29 million), 18-month Phase A contract awarded July 7 by the European Space Agency (ESA), EADS Astrium will establish the initial design for a download capsule, known as the Advanced Reentry Vehicle (ARV), that would give Europe the means to bring experiments and other cargo down from the International Space Station (ISS) or a future successor facility. Funding was approved at the ESA ministerial summit last November, and a proposal for further design can be expected to be submitted at the next summit in 2011.
The 27 million euro ARV project will combine elements of the Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), an Astrium-built space tug that brings freight up to the ISS but is designed for destructive re-entry, and the Atmospheric Reentry Demonstrator (ARD), a controlled capsule that flew in October 1998.
Like the ATV, the ARV would fly on the Ariane 5 heavy-lift rocket. Michael Menking, director of orbital infrastructure and space exploration at Astrium, thinks a demonstration flight could take place as early as 2016, if funding is forthcoming.
The project's backers argue that once the space shuttle is withdrawn from service at the end of 2010, only the Soyuz will be available for cargo download missions, and the Soyuz's capacity is considerably less than that of the shuttle. Detractors point out that there is no guarantee the ISS will remain operational beyond the end of the next decade, and no assurance it will be replaced by another orbital facility.
However, the ARV is also conceived as the first step in a process that could lead to a lunar lander and eventually to a manned vehicle that would be launched atop a human-rated version of the Ariane 5. Although Europe is exploring a role in Russia's planned Crew Space Transportation Vehicle, it wants to develop an independent capability that would provide maximum leeway in setting an exploration strategy.
In addition to the ARV, ESA is earmarking 11.5 million euros for an initial lunar lander study, and German aerospace center DLR recently awarded Astrium a contract to study the feasibility of demonstrating a soft lunar-type landing on Earth. If conclusive, DLR could fund a demonstration flight in 2012.
"Together with the entry, descent and landing module on the ExoMars rover mission, set for 2016, the lunar lander and ARV will show Europe's ability to land on the Earth, the moon and Mars," Astrium Space Transportation CEO Alain Charmeau says. In parallel with the ARV, which is based on an Apollo capsule design, ESA is building a lifting-body demonstrator, the IXV, that is to fly in 2012 atop a Vega launcher. A 37 million euro authorization to proceed for the IXV, which is being developed within ESA's Future Launcher Preparatory Program, was issued last month to Thales Alenia Space (Aerospace DAILY, June 18).
Artist's concept of Advanced Reentry Vehicle: ESA
